I have a long commute in and out of a large city. Since I spend so much time on the road, I always try to get the details of Amber Alert notifications to be on the lookout for vehicles used in abductions. I guess I can’t do that anymore since Twitter requires an account to see Amber Alerts. Hopefully my state finds another platform to post them.
In my jurisdiction, Amber Alerts are delivered by SMS. Using Twitter for police notifications seems bizarre.
In my area, amber alerts are delivered via Localized Emergency Alerts, and clicking on it takes you to the Highway Patrol Twitter page.
That’s crazy.
I was going to say it’s crazy that your local police use a private service like Twitter, but I guess the phone companies are a private service too.
Phone services are required to put out the message though, just like you’re able to dial 911 from a phone even if you don’t have service (if you’re in a covered area).
Twitter is not required.
Yeah, but you’re right in that phone companies are a public utility, so the government has more say in what they can do.
It does come as a notification, and I ended up finding it in my notification history.